Lochans and Carved Faces

February 18, 2023March 1, 2023 | Rebecca Gibson

Monday was the perfect combination of winter chill and dazzling sunshine, so I decided to take my mum and the dog to two of my favourite wild spots down in the Cairngorms.

Looking like a blue pawprint when seen on a map, the Uath (pronounced ‘wah’) Lochans are four small pools bordered by pines. Their surfaces are sometimes wobbled by goldeneye ducks but they mostly stay mirror-steady, reflecting the trunks standing around them.

There are two short waymarked trails that can easily be combined into a meandering loop. One threads between the lochans, following compacted earth paths and sections of boardwalk over boggy pools. The other climbs a brief incline, offering an eagle’s eye view over carpets of pine and further into the mountains.

Less than three miles north, the Frank Bruce Sculpture Collection is a series of artworks that have been carved into wood and stone, destined to eventually rot and fade back into their woodland surroundings.

Because the carvings are natural, they have excellent camouflage and some are trickier to find than others. It takes a while for your eyes to adjust before you can pick out sculpted faces and hands among all the other trunks. A needle in haystack situation!

It’s possible to walk a small loop here too, following a stretch of the River Feshie as it tumbles over pale shingle. The river sparkled and the trees beyond shimmered in the winter sunlight.

Although the sun was boiling as it streamed through the car windows, outside was a different matter, so once the chill began to seep through our clothes we returned home. The winter light persisted until the very last moment and I wandered up to the headland to watch the sun set. It’s not often I spend a day without looking at screens, so it was a welcome treat.

Review: ‘The Stranding’

February 10, 2023March 7, 2023 | Rebecca Gibson

We’re told not to judge a book by its cover but we all do it, at least in the literal sense. Why else is Waterstones full of vibrant, juicy covers begging to be picked up and admired? So, when I saw a whale on the front of this book, it enticed me enough to read the blurb. And what a hook: “Far from home and with no real hope of survival, Ruth finds herself climbing into the mouth of a beached whale alongside a stranger.” Without wanting to sound like a T-Bird, tell me more.

Ruth’s life has become a hamster wheel of alcohol, bed hopping and a sense of something missing. When her latest relationship becomes claustrophobic, she decides to break the monotonous cycle she’s found herself in and travel to New Zealand. Here she hopes to fulfil a childhood dream of working with whales, but apocalypse strikes as soon as she arrives – don’t you hate it when well-laid plans get disrupted? Together with a stranger she meets on the beach, Ruth climbs into the mouth of a beached whale just before the blast hits. This saves her life, but now she has to figure out how to continue living.

This is only half the book, though. Alternating between chapters set in post-apocalyptic New Zealand are fragments of Ruth’s old life and the events that led to her trip. Somehow, there were close parallels between a dystopian world and the everyday routine of a young woman living in London, made sharper by the interwoven timelines. Like all good protagonists, Ruth has many flaws, and this makes her feel real. She makes human mistakes, and despite also building a shelter from whale ribs and making clothes from dried deer hides, her story resonates.

For me, part of this connection came from the book’s setting. I’ve never been to New Zealand, but “the breeze from across the water” and pulling “the salt-stiffened collar of the fleece towards her ears” were familiar sensations. Rather than obvious seaside description, Kate Sawyer uses thoughtful observations of a coastal landscape that essentially apply to any sandy beach in the world. Although my life in England wasn’t nearly so troubled as Ruth’s, I know exactly how being pulled somewhere feels; in her case it was to the whales she’d studied as a child in London’s Natural History Museum. The wonder of that place is something I can definitely relate to.

Dystopian stories have never interested me much, but I loved The Stranding because it was so much more than that. In fact, the apocalypse element was a back-seat theme for me. I felt that the backbone of the story was a woman’s pursuit of happiness and finding the courage to break a cycle and start a better life. And in Ruth’s case, it’s a life she could never have predicted.

Away At Sea

November 20, 2020November 30, 2020 | Rebecca Gibson

It’s been a while since my last post – the past couple of months have been a whirlwind of planning, packing and stress! Earlier this week I came back from a trip of a lifetime to Arctic Norway, but it nearly didn’t happen at all.

For the past three winters, my partner and his friends have made the journey to Skjervøy, a three hour’s drive north of Tromsø, to go whale watching. Large shoals of herring have been drawn into the fjords of northern Norway, attracting humpback whales and orcas. Every year my partner hires a boat and takes the group out to find them. As soon as they returned in 2019 they booked the house for 2020, obviously unaware of how the year would progress.

In the lead up to our departure, our flights were cancelled and rearranged three times. What was originally a trip for eighteen people split over three weeks shrunk to just six of us because we all had to arrive at the same time to do our ten day quarantine. Eventually we made it out there and settled into our beautiful house right on the water’s edge.

It was the best quarantine I could have wished for: white tailed eagles flew directly overhead every morning at 10am sharp; willow tits scooped up the seeds beneath the feeder; velvet scoters cruised across the fjord and best of all, the northern lights shimmered in cloudless skies on most evenings. I felt incredibly fortunate to have reached Norway and had such an enjoyable quarantine!

The first ten days could have been a holiday by themselves, but after we were cleared to leave the house it was time to do what we came to Norway for – head out on the boat to look for giants. More coming soon!

Up in the Air

September 26, 2018 | Rebecca Gibson

The plane roared to life and I experienced the age-old feeling of excitement whenever I fly. As we chased the runway and the plane slowly lifted, I pressed my face to the window to see the ground fall away. I will never tire of that feeling of utter weightlessness – the peculiar thought of something so bulky taking to the air.

I’d been invited onto my boss’s plane for a morning trip to Naples, a city in southwest Florida looking out onto the Gulf of Mexico. We were flying to break in a new engine, and planned to refuel in Naples before returning to Yulee. It was a whistle-stop state tour, a four hour round trip that would take twelve in a car.

Within moments of take-off we were over the beach – long piers stretched out into the sea like the teeth of a comb. At 9am on a Saturday the beach was almost deserted. It was a treat to see so much uninterrupted sand before the tourist tide came rushing in.

We curved back inland and passed over a maze of river and marshland that I had already explored by boat, but this time we were too high to look for egrets. The only movement was the white streak of a lonely boat as it navigated the watery trails. I wondered how many alligators were down there, then decided not to think about that.

The marshy solitude of Amelia Island dissolved into towering office blocks, and I soon recognised downtown Jacksonville. There was the Landing, where I’d been just a week before the shooting. It had been enough to dissuade me from visiting downtown again, but I still had fond memories of the river walk, the MOSH museum and the topaz blue water of Friendship Fountain.

Leaving vast, sprawling Jacksonville behind, the landscape was soon dominated by trees again. Green was undoubtedly a primary colour in Florida – a patchwork quilt of field and forest stretched as far as the eye could see. In some places the trees were confined in tightly packed cubic parameters. In others, they were sprinkled sporadically. Criss-crossed over it all were the highways, dead straight lines in parallel and perpendicular.

Fluffy cumulus clouds were gathering, and a rather ominous feeling began to grow in my stomach as we bumped over them. Sunlight poured into the stuffy cabin, which did nothing to suppress my queasiness. Because of the new engine, we had no choice but to fly low. While the views were still stunning, I was somewhat distracted by the turbulent ride, and as Naples came into view I couldn’t help feeling slightly relieved that we’d be getting out of the clouds.

Once down on the ground, we stopped just long enough to stock up on drinks – fuel for the plane, a Gatorade for me – before taking off again, back through the spectrum of concrete jungles and green wildernesses.

Success!

April 30, 2018March 10, 2020 | Rebecca Gibson

I was back on Bryher today, having another go at finding the elusive dwarf pansy. As was becoming a daily ritual, I engaged in friendly conversation with my fellow passengers on the Seahorse as it made its leisurely way out of St Mary’s Quay.

“That’s a fancy bit of kit you’ve got there,” one man said, gesturing at the camera hanging from my neck, “What are you hoping to photograph?”

I told them about my mission to find the dwarf pansy, to which the man said, “Ah yes, such a shame about the flowers this year.”

I supposed he was referring to the recent snowfall, which had pushed the growth and emergence of the Scilly wildflowers back a few weeks. Still, I didn’t like his pessimism and although I smiled politely I was feeling confident. The weather had been and still was beautiful, and I was here to find the dwarf pansy. So when the boat docked and I hopped onto dry land I strode towards Rushy Bay with steely confidence. The sun was already beating down and incidentally I would later regret not covering my sore, red ears from that beating sun. Meanwhile, I was on my hands and knees peering at grass and getting some very strange looks from passers-by. I found my tiny purple flower from last visit, which I vowed to ask the tour guide about on my walk that afternoon.

By lunchtime my stomach was rumbling, so I tucked into my sandwiches and rested my sore knees. It really was a stunning day, and I had the beach almost to myself. A couple of holidaymakers were foraging for shells by the water, and every so often a dog appeared with a wide-eyed expression of sheer joy before loping back over the dunes.

I decided to give the area one more scope before it was time to walk back to the quay and meet the tour group. Just behind the high grass was a group of binocular-glad walkers huddled together gazing at something on the ground. My heart leapt into my mouth and I hovered awkwardly where I was standing. Was it cheeky to go over and exploit their find? I hadn’t paid for their walk, after all.

But this was the dwarf pansy, so I made a beeline and gazed between shoulders to see Will Wagstaff pointing at a tiny white speck in the grass. I waited as patiently as I could, hopping from one foot to the other, for the group to take their turns photographing the pansy. Once they’d dispersed, I lay down on the grass and noticed there were two! One was fully open, the other was partially closed but still beautiful; in fact, it was a real stroke of luck to see two different stages beside each other.

The Red Ruby cattle mooed at me as I lay there, trying countless angles and focuses. A man and his son approached me and asked what I was doing. In moments we were talking about the pansy, my uni work, and he was amazed that I’d come all this way for a flower. After he’d moved off another couple appeared from Heathy Hill, and once again I showed them what I was so captivated by. Like all the others, they responded with the courteous “oh really?” and “wow!” but I could tell they weren’t nearly as excited as I was. I wanted to shake them and say they were not found anywhere else in the UK, only this tiny archipelago! I had to share my joy with someone who’d appreciate just how special the sighting was.

So, as I hurried back to the quay, now nearly late for the walk, I rang my parents and wheezed my good news. They’d shared my worry and calmed my panics on the run-up to the expedition so were thrilled that I’d found what I came for. I was beaming ear to ear.

Once I got to the meeting place and Darren, the guide from the Isles of Scilly Wildlife Trust, told us our route, I realised we weren’t even going through Rushy Bay, so I would have missed the pansy completely! I was hesitant to call it fate, but if I hadn’t eaten my lunch where I did, I’d have been journeying back to St Mary’s very disappointed.

The Spirit of St Agnes

April 26, 2018April 18, 2018 | Rebecca Gibson

As soon as we docked at St Agnes’ Quay I asked a nearby guide when it was safe to cross over to Gugh, the neighbouring island linked to St Agnes by a sand bridge that disappeared when the tide came in. Getting stranded on an island with two houses and no facilities would be less than ideal. Luckily, the guide told me that the tide would be far enough out to be able to cross all day, so I made my way over to Gugh. My first object of interest was the Old Man of Gugh, a menhir dating back from the Bronze Age. Menhirs are tall upright standing stones erected by people living on the islands many thousands of years ago.

After getting acquainted with the Old Man, I wandered down to Beady Pool, so named because to this day ceramic beads from a 17^th century Venetian shipwreck can be found there. Although it was tempting to have a little look, I already had enough miniscule treasure to find, so after eating my lunch looking out to sea (again!) I walked out to Wingletang Down.

The first thing I noticed – after the forest of gorse that almost completely covered Wingletang Down – was the Devil’s Punchbowl; a curious name for a curious phenomenon. It was described as a rocking stone because it was positioned in such a way that it rocked easily from side to side. Looking loosely like a ball and socket joint, the top of the stone was a sphere cut in half, resting on top of a thick, squat column of stone. What was most intriguing was that the stone was completely natural. Somehow, Mother Nature had created the Devil’s Punchbowl for seemingly no reason other than to exist, perched at the tip of St Agnes.

Amongst all the orange of the gorse were the delicate flowers of Ornithopus pinnatus, my target wild plant on St Agnes. After nibbling a few Haribo and admiring the Punchbowl a little longer, I began to search for it. However, after seemingly no time I noticed that time was running away from me again, and I headed around St Warna’s Cove towards another peculiarity: the Nag’s Head. Another naturally occurring feature of the landscape fully exposed to the Atlantic, the granite stone has been moulded into unusual shapes by the water and wind, so now it has a likeness to the head of a horse. William Borlase, a Cornish antiquarian saw the strange hollows and shapes of the Nag’s Head and thought the stone had been moulded by ancient cups and bowls, when in fact every mark on the granite is natural. It was yet another feature of the Scilly landscape that gave it its intriguing and quite unique personality.

Learning to Birdlisten

March 5, 2018March 4, 2018 | Rebecca Gibson

Today marks the beginning of a new project: learning to birdlisten. It’s a much-used cliché but I have been an avid birdwatcher since I was a child. I’d sit out in the garden, hold as still as I possibly could, and after a while birds would begin to show, hopping out from under bushes and descending slowly from the treetops. This gradual emergence, the steady drip-drop of birds, was so exciting to me. The species would usually be very common – robin, dunnock, blackbird – but occasionally a blue tit or great tit would appear, and to my amateur eye these were very special indeed.

As my knowledge gradually improved, I began to notice more species and although the trusty robin and dunnock never grew boring, they lost their shine among more colourful or charismatic varieties. One by one I added birds to my repertoire, and although I didn’t notice my mental list growing, soon I could identify a wide range of species. Although waterfowl and waders had their charm, my favourites were always the passerines, or “perching birds”.

Passerines include a subgroup of species we call songbirds but are more accurately named oscines – birds that establish their territories by means of musical vocalisations. It never occurred to me why the singing birds attracted me most, until I turned my attention to listening for birds instead of looking for them, and then it became abundantly clear.

Birdsong is the soundtrack of nature. Even for me, a keen bird enthusiast, birdsong had blurred into the background of my time spent outdoors, nothing more than a pleasant backing track that accompanied my attempts to birdwatch. Why on earth did I let birdsong become such an unimportant feature of the landscape, no more significant than hold music? It was high time that I paid more attention to it, instead of letting it wash over my ears without acknowledgment. It is so true that we see but don’t observe, but it is also the case that many of us hear but don’t listen.

Author of “Birdwatching With Your Eyes Closed” Simon Barnes points out that understanding birdsong allows us to see around corners. There’s a bird hidden up in the canopy somewhere, but unless you know its song you’ll never know what it is. I’ve had this frustration many times, when I see the distorted outline of a bird but no characteristic features that give it away. If I hadn’t neglected my auditory senses, I wouldn’t have been disappointed when the bird hopped further out of view.

And so begins my journey to learn the language of birdsong. It seemed a daunting prospect at first; to my untrained ear all chirrups and whistles sounded identical. However, like any problem, it is imperative to break it down, and that makes it far less intimidating.

I have already made progress. First was the robin: an unmistakable bird in appearance, and a good place to start when learning birdsong because of its presence all year round. During the usually hushed winter months, the robin still sings, an isolated soloist filling cold air with thin, gentle melodies. Spring is by far the most frustrating time to begin birdlistening, so to hear the robin on a chilly February morning with no other avian distractions allows us to begin to tune into this new world I for one took for granted.

The wren also sings in winter, but has a far louder song bordering on rowdy. For such a small bird, the song bursts out of hedgerows, with a telltale trill at the end of some phrases, like a twirl of icing atop a cake. Then there is the two-note song of the great tit, like the squeak of a saw being pulled back and forth.

And so on. Already my ears are filling with birdsong and I’m really listening this time. Acquiring the skill of understanding this rich and varied language will not only help me become a better birdwatcher, but it will pave the way to a clearer understanding of nature as a whole – appreciating nature’s vibrant soundtrack.

Northumberland: Day Three

November 27, 2017November 27, 2017 | Rebecca Gibson

There was no frost today, but the sun was shining brightly and I knew the larches on the hills would be lit up like fiery beacons. We only had the morning, as we were leaving the bothy just after lunch, so first I headed out with Cain to pick up the camera traps. I was wrapped up in my fleece but was soon peeling layers off – the weather was surprisingly warm today with such bright sunshine and little wind.

Just before we returned to the bothy to check the footage, Cain took me to see the huge troops of orange fungi up the hill by the clearing. I’d just been saying how little fungi I’d seen, but I was soon proved wrong when I saw how many there were up here. Sprinkled all the way along the track were small orange bulbs of every shape and size. Some were illuminated in patches of sunlight, which made their colours shine even brighter.

As I was stooped on the ground photographing the fungi, I heard a bizarre sound that reminded me of an angry cat. I turned and saw the outer layer of trees swaying in the growing wind, releasing the most peculiar creaking noises. Cain explained how these trees would usually grow on the inside of the forest, but due to felling they were now on the outer layer and were struggling to cope with the battering elements. Some had already succumbed, and we passed gigantic trees lying flat on the forest floor, their roots larger than tractor wheels.

Out in the open, the wind was a lot stronger, so we ducked back down and sought the shelter of the forest. We gathered everyone in the bothy and had a look to see if the traps had been successful. Sadly, the two I had put out only had footage of my bobble hat as I attached and detached the trap from its post. However, Cain had put one in the garden and this had filmed several clips of a bank vole darting in and out of the rock pile. Later in the night, a wood mouse joined the scene, distinguishable by its longer tail and much larger Mickey Mouse ears. So, the traps weren’t a complete disaster, but certainly no pine marten footage.

Sightings

Bank vole – on camera trap (Myodes glareolus)
Chaffinch(Fringilla coelebs)
Kestrel(Falco tinnunculus)
Robin(Erithacus rubecula)
Wood mouse – on camera trap (Apodemus sylvaticus)

Northumberland: Day Two

November 24, 2017November 24, 2017 | Rebecca Gibson

When I woke up the blinds were bright. I had a peek outside and was thrilled to see there was a frost clinging to the grass. I hurried into clothes and headed out into the garden. It had been a full year since my last frost and I was eager to capture some macro photos again. Leaves, twigs and thistles were all coated in a fine layer of silver crystals that, when hit by the sun, twinkled and shone like last night’s stars. Soon I had wet knees from crouching in the grass and the beginnings of a crick in my neck from getting as close as possible. My plan was to crop the photos in to create a repeating abstract texture. As usual, I took far more than I probably needed.

After relaxing for a while in the bothy I headed out again, down one hill and up the next. I passed the tyre swing, but the lack of decent light meant the shots weren’t quite what I imagined. I knew I had to photograph the bright yellow and orange larches that had taken my breath away on the drive in yesterday. Unfortunately the sun that I’d wanted to shine was well and truly concealed behind thick clouds; the light was so diluted I could gaze in its direction without difficulty. However, when I began to shoot, the rusty warm hues still popped. I began to experiment with positioning individual subjects like stray grasses in front of the camera, so the trees bled together and created a vibrant background.

The rest of the day was spent writing beside the fire and recording what I’d seen during the day. I had a sneaky look at my photos so far and was pleased with some of the outcomes. Hopefully there’d be more opportunities on our last day tomorrow.